Mourinho enlists Terry's contract talks in battle of wills with his board

Jose Mourinho last night increased the pressure on Chelsea's directors to provide the support that he insists he needs to remain at the club beyond this season by bringing John Terry into the picture. The captain is in talks over a new contract and Mourinho revealed that the centre-back has asked him whether he will be staying at Stamford Bridge and told him he would like to work with him for the rest of his career.

Mourinho claimed that Terry was set to sign an extension, confirming what the club's chief executive, Peter Kenyon, said at the weekend, but sent a message to his board that it will upset arguably Chelsea's most important player if there is a change of manager next summer.

It was tempting to see Mourinho's words as carefully timed and directed when he raised the issue of Terry. Questioned about how he had persuaded Andriy Shevchenko to work for the team, Mourinho referred to it being "a process" and mentioned how attached Terry has become to his approach.

"When he tells me that it will be very difficult for him to play under another manager in his career and he would like to do it with me to the end of his career it's because he accepts my philosophy as his philosophy," he said. "He feels comfortable. So it's a process. It's not a clique. Gary Neville says the same about Sir Alex [Ferguson] - that he would like to do his whole career with him. He is comfortable with him."

Mourinho's future has been left in doubt amid tensions with the owner, Roman Abramovich, and the board. The manager confirmed that Terry had asked him during contract negotiations whether he would be at the club next season. "My answer was 'I think so'," he said.

The former Porto coach, who said Terry was back in training after a calf injury, has suggested he will leave unless he feels he is receiving the necessary backing from his directors. He reiterated last night that he was not referring to transfer funds being made available this month. Fundamental to him, though, are matters such as having complete control over the make-up of his backroom staff after the club proposed bringing in Avraham Grant from Portsmouth to add to the coaching team.

It has been suggested the intention was to get Grant to work with Shevchenko but there seemed little wrong with the striker last night. Abramovich was not here to witness a revived Shevchenko, who earned high praise from Mourinho. It was not so much the two goals as the work-rate that delighted the manager. Mourinho dropped the Ukrainian recently and indicated that was because the former Milan player had not been working hard enough. "I'm very happy Sheva got the message," he said. "If somebody thought I'm not playing him because I have a personal situation with him, it is a very silly thought from somebody who doesn't understand the game. I want to win. I have to play the team I think is best for the team."

He added: "Tonight he gave us what we need. I think it's not easy to do it with a clique. This is Chelsea, this is a Jose Mourinho team with specific qualities and a specific philosophy and you need some time to do that. I want him to repeat what he did, and I'm not speaking about the goals because goals depend on many things, but in his movements, his contributions to the team, his effort to create spaces, his work to win the ball."

He feels this could prove a turning point and confirmed Shevchenko would start in the FA Cup at home to Nottingham Forest on Sunday. "I don't think it's the moment yet for fireworks but it's a step forward," he said. "I'm very happy."

Mourinho gave Shevchenko a thumbs-up and handshake after substituting the striker, having ignored him after Saturday's defeat at Liverpool. "Sometimes you kiss and sometimes you kick," he said. "In this case I ignored. What I do with him is what I do with every player. It doesn't matter if he cost £30m, another £30,000. The players have to work and perform. If they work and perform I love them. If they don't work and perform I hate them."